Byte Size Review

When 900 words is too much and about 250 will do.

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Byte Size – Dead Or Alive 6 Review (Xbox One X)

Barrie Clarke 1156 Views

The latest in the titillating fighting franchise is here and packs everything you would expect into a nicely rounded package.  Team Ninja have continued with the plethora of scantily clad girls who can kick butt. And thanks to the latest generation of gaming equipment you get to witness all the bouncing and jiggling that goes with the high intensity combat. And just for full disclosure, I am terrible at fighting games and resort to full on button mashing 99% of the time.

The Good – Underneath all the eye candy is a solid and smooth fighting game. There are tons of moves and combos to learn for those who are inclined to do so, but for mashers like me there is still plenty of fun to be had.

The Bad – This is easy, unfortunately. Well for Xbox anyway. The online side of things is almost completely devoid of players. And considering the type of competitive game we have here this is a real problem.

The Unlocks! – So at release there are 27 fighters each with different costumes, hair styles, glasses, and god knows what else to unlock. Now for me this is a nightmare. I like to have everything in a game, call me a completionist if you will. But the time needed to unlock everything here would be huge.

Anyway, if you want a fighting game DOA6 is still one of the breast, umm, best.

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Byte Size – The Wizards Enhanced Edition, PSVR Review

Richard Armitt 1319 Views ,  , 

Harry Potter is a shit Wizard, make no mistake.

In my youth, when books were still a big thing I had firm favourites in the Wizarding space, these guys were qualified as Wizards because they actually did proper magic and I loved it, and I wanted to do it too.

The Good – Casting spells! With your hands!

The Bad – Old School level design and AI.

The Ugly – 2006 called, they want their textures back!

Overall it is a fun game, while being a throwback to the nineties in look and level feel it offers plenty of suspended disbelief as you creep around looking for the next encounter and spend a few minutes fervently creating and using spells.

It is a game I will go back to and certainly puts the power in your hands.

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Byte Size – Objects in Space Review (PC)

Barrie Clarke 1382 Views ,  ,  , 

Objects in Space from the self proclaimed smallest of the small game developers, Flat Earth Games, is so strangely familiar to me and any gamers who played through the 1990’s will no doubt feel pangs of good old retro revival.

The Good – Upgrades to not only your ship but also pretty much every subsystem, along with trading, bounties, exploration, and combat makes for a really full on experience. And because of the gameplay, I found Objects in Space to be quite relaxing to play.

The Bad – For me the biggest hurdle was the font used for communications. When dealing with traders and the likes I found myself having to give my eyes a rest after each paragraph or so.

The Overwhelming – As mentioned, there is a fair amount to take on in Objects in Space, you can just stay in safe systems and trade your way to riches or head out to the new worlds, a much more dangerous affair. Then you have upgrades, trade prices, navigation, repairs, the list is endless in the life of a solo space captain.

Closing Comments – As we say down here in New Zealand and Australia, bit of a Marmite game this one. You will either love it or hate it.

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Byte Size – Guns ‘n’ Stories: Bulletproof, PSVR Review

Guy 1390 Views ,  , 

Waveshooters have unfortunately been the staple diet of the Playstation VR for over 2 years, Guns’n’Stories: Bulletproof is no different.

The Good – The variety of weapons and the changing game-world was entertaining, as it kept me on my toes over the roughly 90min romp.

The Bad – It’s a wave shooter that does little to revolutionise the genre and frankly there are better titles on PSVR that should be played first.

The Ugly – The missions are just too long and overstay their welcome.

This is far from a ‘must buy’, but it actually looks quiet good and is mechanically sound to play. Simply put, it was a fun way for me and the kids to spend a rainy Sunday afternoon. It has to be given credit for doing what it says on the box and doing it well. There are GUNS, and they are fun. There are STORIES, and they are (at times) quite funny.

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Byte Size ReviewGamingPS4Xbox One

Byte Size – Far Cry New Dawn Review (Xbox One X)

Barrie Clarke 1851 Views ,  ,  ,  , 

Returning to Hope County 17 years and a nuclear war after the events of Far Cry 5 finds the county some what brighter than one would expect.

The Good – It is the Far Cry 5 we all know and love, but with and excellent splash of colour and some RPG-lite elements thrown in.

The Bad – Like Far Cry 5 you can have an ally along side to help out. Just don’t rely on them to get the job done.

The New – Since the map is effectively the same as Far Cry 5 the addition of Expeditions has been made to create a bit of variety. The Expedition maps themselves are a good mix and some pretty cool locations too.

Overall I found Far Cry New Dawn more engaging that Far Cry 5, considering this is just a re-skin, and what some would argue should have been just a DLC, it shows it has something special.

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Byte Size – God Eater 3

Richard Armitt 1352 Views ,  , 

The God Eater series is not something I am familiar with, lets have that out in the open. As a sci-fi soap opera, I’m sure it would be interesting to delve into, but as it stands being a virgin in the God Eater universe I’m a little more dazed and confused than leading the charge.

The Good – There’s a deep sci-fi canon on offer if you can listen to the dialogue, and the unfeasible weapons are impressive. The bullet building feature is the highlight.

The Bad – Angsty teen styled dialogue, overly complex controls and too much to remember.

The Ugly – The graphics need a decent feed. Combat missions are way too short.

The combat is fun to a point, but given some of the controls and the reliance on remembering how or when to use certain combos it never really gets past the hack and slash approach for me.

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Byte Size – Riot: Civil Unrest, PS4 Review

Guy 1355 Views ,  , 

Living in New Zealand in 2019, I don’t tend to be exposed to large scale civil unrest. So as a resident of gods-own, Riot: Civil Unrest immediately caught my attention, for being about something I have little knowledge or experience of,  and frankly it is one of the more unique ideas for a video game I have seen in recent months.

The Good – The scenarios are based around real world incidents, including ‘The Arab Spring’ and the game is nuanced enough, even with its limited art style, to relay how difficult civil unrest is on both sides of the riot line.

The Bad – At times the 8bit art style looks great with cleverly designed sprites, but it very quickly becomes a blur of activity and it is hard at times to know whats going on.

The Ugly – The designers have made a strategy game with only one way to approach any given scenario to properly win, which for an RTS, takes the fun of choice away.

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Byte Size ReviewGamingPS4Xbox One

Byte Size – Hitman 2 Review (Xbox One X)

Barrie Clarke 1590 Views

So everybody’s favourite barcoded bald badass is back and kicking things off in Hawkes Bay, here in good old New Zealand. Who knew we were such a haven for bad guys? Anyone who can make a shaved head and red tie look this good has got my attention, that is for sure. Assuming most, if not all gamers out there will have at least heard of Agent 47.

The Good – Well it’s Hitman isn’t it.

The Bad – If I had to pick on something it would have to be the visuals. Hitman 2, even with One X Enhancements, looks a bit dated.

The Loose Steering Wheel – As you can imagine, there is more than one way to skin a cat, or in this case knock off a bad dude along with other variables in each mission. This means more than a few plays through each assignment will be required.

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Byte Size – Gungrave VR, PSVR Review

Guy 1577 Views ,  ,  , 

Initially I knew nothing about Gungrave, but after a quick Google Search, I came to understand that this is a long standing Anime franchise from Japan and it has had a single video game release back in 2002 on the PS2.

Gungrave’s overarching story is about Brandon Heat or ‘Grave’, a reincarnated death dealer who seeks revenge on evil syndicates and baddies and …well you get the idea.

The Good – There isn’t any. Maybe the character model of Grave, it looks quite good at times, and the tutorial is quite good. But that’s about it.

The Bad – The shooting feels slow, the enemies are mindless cannon fodder and the whole game lacks any identity.

The Ugly – It’s just not fun. Nothing in the game adds anything to the brilliantly immersive VR gaming-space.

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Byte Size – Beat Saber, PSVR Review

Guy 1695 Views ,  , 

With Playstation VR going from strength to strength in 2018 though, it seemed only matter of time before an immersive music-based game would raise its virtual head. Low and behold, little known Czech-based developer Beat Games have done just that.

The Good- Beat Saber is a game where the whole family can play….and more importantly, WANT to play. It is unique, easy to understand and fun. There is no motion sickness, looks great and even works as light physical exercise. My wife is NOT (yes in capitals)… not a gamer, and she loves this game.

The Bad – The music selection is very limited, which is a big deal for a music rhythm game. None of the songs you will likely know, and worse you cannot add custom music like our PC cousins can.

The Ugly – At $48.95 it’s pretty expensive when compared to some of the other amazing titles on offer on PSVR.

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Byte Size – Titanic VR, PSVR

Richard Armitt 1557 Views , 

History can’t go past the sinking of the Titanic, it is a story that will run and run, obviously there is the support from Hollywood in various guises and the potential for Mr Clive Palmer and his ambitious reconstruction of actual Titanic v2.

What VR Education have done is taken their Kickstarter project and delivered the all too familiar story with some historical accuracy, wrapped up in a VR learning experience.

The Good – Enjoy an otherwise out of reach experience first hand.

The Bad – The cinematic story is a bit cheesy.

The Ugly – Textures could be crisper, but that’s not so bad.

Titantic VR, may not be perfect but it ticks some boyhood boxes for me and is a good use of twenty bucks.

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